#in terms of plot

[waugh-bao]

“She will go back to where she comes from, and he will follow her; he will show up in her life again and again, shadowing her with his awkward undeclarative kind of love. She will take him to her secret places, the dynamite factory, the Nazi bunker, she will introduce him to friends she has just begun to tell him about. And he too over time will take her to the places he loves…”- Rat by Fernanda Eberstadt (2009)

[gertritude-art]

A fun way imo to develop characters is to look at them and ask, "what does this imply?" This unfortunately only works if you already have a character concept in mind, but it's always been useful for me when I need to create some interiority for a character who feels a little flat.

As previously stated, literally all you're doing is looking at a character and performing a rudimentary analysis of them based on what you've already developed. A good example of this is my character Mordred, who early on in his development was conceived of as a sickly looking teenager wearing a full suit and bowtie. This is because I thought there was a lot of potential in this image. "What kind of teenager goes to school everyday wearing a full suit and bowtie?" Probably a kid who takes himself very seriously and has some interest in looking "polished" -- perhaps he even views himself above his peers for how he dresses. And, how might this visual extend to other aspects of him? Is he always someone who goes against the grain? Does he actually have an interest in men's wear, or is this a symbolic image for how he stands against his peers? I bet he has strong opinions on society. Did he buy the suit himself, or did his mom buy it, because one or the other also implies some stuff about the nature of their relationship, if his mother is supportive of his oddness or not, etc. etc. etc. A lot of stuff that you can find out, just from looking at one small aspect of a character! The same kind of process can spiral from anything - a character's actions, a character's thoughts, their beliefs, a line they say, a face they make, a hobby they have... all can be a good starting point for developing them further and figuring out more about them.

In a similar vein, I know that people recommend filling out character charts and stuff, but usually I find it more useful to think of a character in terms of a "scenario" or a "description" than in terms of their traits. "This character is smart" vs. "This characters complains to the teacher when the test has a question that isn't in the book" ; "This person is stubborn" vs. "This is the kind of person who'd rather starve than order food if they said they weren't hungry." Figuring out a character through something like this gives me a specific image of how they might act in a story as opposed to more broadly-described traits. Being as I tend to think up characters with story ideas and scenarios, it's much more helpful for me! "Ah, but how do you do this, Gert?" Easy: you stare at a wall for multiple hours until you have a revelation about a character. This is surely what everyone is capable of [nodding sagely]

[goldensunset]

when people refer to canon story-relevant kingdom hearts games as ‘spinoffs’ it makes me sad not only for the obvious reasons i always say but also bc like man i WISH this series had spinoffs. imagine what they could do if they had permission from nomura to truly go off the rails and ignore the greater canon for a second and just do some fun whimsical plotless thing in an alternate universe. imagine a fishing/boating game on destiny islands. kh fighting game. it is an injustice that we have been deprived of kingdom karts. can anyone hear me

[noodles-and-tea]

👀

[oifaaa]

I do wonder if people who used to constantly complain about "filler" are finally happy now if they're enjoying the state of television series or if they're now complaining that tv shows only have 8 episodes per season like the rest of us

[wheneverfeasible]

Omegaverse AU where Steve presents as an alpha just like his father always wanted, just like everyone expects, just like he was supposed to. He exclusively dates betas, scoffing and saying omegas weren’t good enough for him. He said they were too needy, too annoying, too pathetic. He was an alpha.

He hates it.

The truth is that Steve always wanted to be an omega, always wanted to soft and taken care of, wanted to be pupped up, wanted to avoid the stupid knotheads that he was forced to surround himself with, forced to pretend to be. He never dated an omega because he wants to be one and wants desperately for another alpha to take him as their own.

Enter Eddie, an alpha unlike any other. He scorns alphas like Steve and Tommy and Billy and all the other knotheads who act like they’re so much better than anyone else just because of their secondary gender. He rants on top of cafeteria tables about it, has ever since he presented and actually had the other alphas try to talk to him at first as if he was one of them.

No fucking thank you.

Steve is…not enamored, but curious about the super senior. Nancy broke up with him, he and Tommy are sort of on the outs though still barely friends, and Billy has a one-sided rivalry for the crown Steve currently wore, not that Steve truly cared about it.

Blah blah blah, Steve propositions Eddie after watching him for a while, realizing that Eddie might just be the sort of alpha who would fuck Steve and let him pretend to be an omega for a little while, meanwhile Eddie thinks King Steve wants to start shit with him like a knotheaded alpha and is wary and lightly mocking at first, until he realizes what Steve wants.

Steve and Eddie become fuckbuddies, nothing more, where Steve gets to role play as an omega and have Eddie dominate him, who seems to know that Steve wants to pretend to be cared for rather than playing the slut role he’s been doing as an alpha, and Steve actually breaks down in tears the first time Eddie calls him “good boy” and “good omega” though they both pretend he didn’t.

And you see, bitching isn’t really well known yet. It’s not really a thing that’s spoken about amongst polite society. So neither of them clock it when, as their feelings for each other grow, Steve becomes a little more emotional, a little more irrational in regards to Eddie’s attention, and they use scent blockers and neutralizers all the time to keep their affairs secret, so they don’t notice Steve’s scent changing, or the fact that he’s starting to become more than just artificially wet, or his knot doesn’t really pop like it used to because they both steadfastly had ignored it for so long to play the role right.

And it’s just not known. It’s not something that’s really spoken about, so they’d never think about it.

So no, they don’t notice anything until it’s too late, until it happens, and Steve is suddenly thrown into a spontaneous heat after an intense basketball game or something, the final stages of his transition. There was too much sweating, too much testosterone, that the blockers and neutralizers don’t really cut it anymore.

Billy makes the winning shot as the heat hits, making Steve’s legs collapse under him as slick coats his drawers and shorts, dripping down his thighs. All alpha heads suddenly towards him as his new true scent bursts out, surprise on all their faces, even hunger on some.

Billy and Tommy both take a step towards him but are forced to stop by a growl that reverberates through Steve as if it were his own as the familiar scent hits him of blockers and tobacco and weed and leather and that stupid cheap shampoo/conditioner/body wash 3-in-1 that Eddie uses as strong arms wrap around him and dark hair cascades around him.

Because he’s there. His alpha. He’s always there, hiding in the corner or under bleachers or somewhere where Steve can’t see him and he’s always there because this stupid thing between them has become so much more than either of them ever expected and he’s so protective of his omega because Steve is his omega even when he was an alpha because he was always an omega even when he wasn’t biologically.

It isn’t ideal. It far from fucking ideal, but Eddie whisks Steve away in his arms, whispering those words of praise that used to only belong in their role play, but Steve is burning up and he can’t wait can’t wait can’t wait can’t wait can’twaitcan’twaitcan’tfuckingwait—

And Eddie pulls him into classroom, locks and bars the door with desks and chairs and whatever else, and then he’s there he’s there he’stherehe’stherehe’sthere.

Eddie wants to bite, wants to mark, wants to claim, but he knows now isn’t the time so all he does is help Steve through it while he’s all but delirious from the sudden heat rewriting him completely.

Afterwards, they will talk. They will confess. They will admit. They will acknowledge that they were his alpha, his omega, and had been for longer than either of them realized. They will slink to Eddie’s car, go to Eddie’s trailer, will wash off all scents artificial and other until the them, finally just them and they will find the truth in each other. They will find a love that thrived against all odds. A love that beat fate itself.

Eddie does eventually bite him, and Steve completes it with his own, and eventually Steve gets his and his alpha’s pups like he always wanted and he can bask in the knowledge that he was exactly where he was always meant to be, with an alpha that loves and cherishes him exactly as he is, with a pack both of his own pups and the pups he all but adopted as their babysitter and real friends he gathered along the way he never thought he would be lucky enough to have.

It’s not easy at first. Of course it’s not. Something practically unheard of happened in a small conservative town like Hawkins. There were bigots and hateful people galore, and at times it even tested Steve and Eddie, but they always survived and always came out on the other side hand-in-hand and triumphant in their growing love.

They know that the best things in life are worth fighting for. And they vowed to never stop fighting. For themselves, for each other, and for everyone and everything they hold dear.

And they have fantastic sex along the way.

[hyacinthsdiamonds]

I'm sorry but the irony of Nico calling Max unprofessional is sending me so bad like sir there's an entire garage full of people, who were literally in the trenches trying to survive the Brocedes fallout while just doing their jobs, who might have a few things to say about your (& Lewis') level of professionalism at that time 😭✋️

[give-grian-rights]

hands on the wall foaming at the mouth screaming and crying about how Surf's Up (2007) is the greatest movie ever . to think, i loved it as a kid, BUT WATCHING IT AT 19 YEARS OF AGE???? JESUS FUCKING CHRIST THE MOVIE IS SO GOOD i know JOY

[gotyouanyway]

something about the doctor doing his "do you get it" monologue to ruby who's already dead.. the companion as a tool, a vehicle for exposition, a body in the room for the doctor to talk to. that he NEEDS to talk to for the exposition to work

[mizaruwu]

"hey! give it back"

"I don't think you should keep using this"

[saintbleeding]

it’s a horror tragedy. people are mean and uncharitable and impatient with him and don’t give him the benefit of the doubt because he is the protagonist of a horror tragedy. u are supposed to think it is tragic. dare i say u are supposed to be horrified.

[lazylittledragon]

i keep trying to think of funny/poetic ways to talk about all the things i'm feeling right now but i honestly can't so. i'm really sad about what happened with my partner. i know he was an inconsiderate prick about it and that i didn't do anything wrong and i couldn't have prevented it but i'm just really fucking sad.

[hyperiion]

I do think Tracker had good points with Kristen’s relationship to clerichood this episode, but her delivery was so rough and also baffling. You’re blowing up your friend’s phone all night to get the okay to call your ex?? And then when she does call it’s like 5 am and she’s like yeah… I need to post my gf but I know you’re sensitive… so can I post her? I need to know NOW. And Kristen was like uhh wow this is a lot for me, of course you can post her but like. I’m not in the place to have a real convo about this yet. And Tracker’s response to that was so. Ugh

[thee-rat-king]

After episode 2: yay!! Izzy is switching genres

After episode 7: oh god. Stede is switching genres

[high-queen-of-the-court]

the foxes are the small town bakery and riko is the commercial bakery trying to kick them out of town. neil is the town outsider who learns the spirit of Christmas and family. he then saves the small town bakery by helping them win the highly competitive bake-off. riko and the ravens leave town out of embarrassment and the small town celebrates

[lord-squiggletits]

I think the key component to my personal reading of post-Delphi Pharma is that he's trying to be a horrible person on purpose. Not "on purpose" in the way that people have free will to exercise their own choices, but in that Pharma's "mad doctor" persona is a performance he puts on to deliberately embrace how much everyone else hates him. Basically, if people already think you're a "bad Autobot" and a horrible doctor who just kills his patients for fun, why try to prove otherwise to people who have already made up their minds about you? Just fully embrace the fact that people see you as an asshole. Don't try to change their minds. Don't plead for their forgiveness or understanding. Just stop caring. If you're going to be remembered as a monster, you might as well be a memorable monster, and eke as much pleasure and hedonism as you can out of it before karma catches up to you and you inevitably crash and burn.

I mean, I guess you could just go the route of "Oh, Pharma was always a fucked up creepy guy and Delphi was just him taking the mask off," but I really don't like that interpretation because, for one, it feels really wrong to take a character like Pharma becoming evil under duress and going, "Oh well clearly he did the things he did because he was evil all along," as if somehow Pharma breaking under blackmail/torture/threat of horrible death was a sign of him having poor moral character. As opposed to, you know, suffering under the very real threat of horrible death for himself and everyone he cares about while being manipulated by a guy who specializes in psychological torture.

The second reason is that it just doesn't make sense to write Pharma as having been evil all along. I mean...

Occam's Razor says that the best argument is the one with the simplest explanation. Doesn't it make way more sense to take Pharma's appearances in flashbacks, his friendship with Ratchet, his stunning medical accomplishments, and the few we see of him speaking kindly/sympathetically (or in the least charitable interpretation, at least professionally) towards his patients and conclude "This guy was just a normal person, if exceptionally talented." Taking all of these flashback appearances at face value and assuming Pharma was being genuine/honest is a way simpler and more logical explanation than trying to argue that Pharma for the past 4 million years was just faking being a good doctor/person. I mean, it's possible within the realm of headcanon, but the fact is Pharma's appearances in the story are so brief that there simply wasn't room in the story for there to be some sort of secret conspiracy/hidden manipulation behind why Pharma acted the way he did in the past.

I just can't help but look at things like Pharma's friendship with Ratchet (himself a good person and usually a fine judge of character) and the fact that even post-Delphi, pretty much every single mention of Pharma comes with some mention of "He was a good doctor for most of his life" or "He was making major headways in research [before he started killing patients]" which implies that even the Autobots themselves see Pharma's villainy as a recent turn in his life compared to how for "most of his life" he "used to be" a good doctor.

And although Pharma doesn't know this, we as the readers (and even other characters like Rung) know about Aequitas technology and the fact that it actually works, so... if Pharma really was an unrepentant murderer, why couldn't he get through the forcefield too? The Aequitas forcefield doesn't require that a person be completely morally pure and free of wrongdoing or else how could Tyrest get through, just that they feel a sense of inner peace and lack feelings of guilt. Pharma has murdered and tortured people by this point, and put on quite a campy and theatrical show of how much he sees it as a fun game, so why then can he not get through?

It circles back to my headcanon at the start of this post that the "mad doctor" persona is just that-- a persona. Delphi/post-Delphi Pharma's laughing madman personality is just so far removed from every flashback we saw of him and everything we can infer based on how other people see/saw him before that, to me, the mad doctor act is (at least in large part, if not fully) a persona that Pharma puts on to put his villainy in the forefront.

To avoid an overly simplistic/ableist take, I don't think Tarn tortured Pharma into turning crazy. To me, it's more like the constant pressure of death by horrific torture, the feeling of martyrdom as Pharma kept secret that he was the only one standing between Delphi and annihilation, the physical isolation of Messatine as well as the emotional separation from Ratchet, being forced to violate his medical oaths (pretty much the only thing Pharma's entire life has been about), etc. All of that combined traumatized Pharma to the point that the only way he could avoid cracking was to just stop caring about all of it. Because at least then, even if he's still murdering patients to save Delphi from a group of sadistic freaks, Pharma doesn't have to feel guilty and sick about doing it. As opposed to the alternatives, which were probably either going off the deep end and killing himself to escape, or confessing to what he did and getting jailed for it.

In that light, Pharma becoming a mad doctor makes sense. It avoids the bad writing tropes of "oh this character who was good his entire life was actually just evil and really good at hiding it" as well as "oh he got tortured and went crazy that's why he's so random and silly and killing people, he's crazy" and instead frames Pharma's evil as something he was forced into, to the point where in order to avoid a full psychological breakdown and keep defending Delphi, he just had to stop caring about the sanctity of life or about what other people might think of him.

Then, of course, the actual Delphi episode happens, and Pharma's own lifelong best friend Ratchet basically spits in his face and sees him as nothing more than a crazy murderer who went rogue from being a good Autobot. Then Pharma gets his hands cut off and left to die on Messatine. At that point, Pharma has not only been mentally/emotionally broken into losing his feelings of compassion, he's received the message loud and clear: He is alone. Everyone hates him. Not even his own best friend likes him any more. No one even cared enough about him to check if he actually died or not. He will only ever be remembered as a doctor who went insane and killed his patients.

So in the light of 1. Having all of your redeeming qualities be squeezed out of you one by one for the sake of survival and 2. Having your reputation and all of your positive relationships be destroyed and 3. People only know/care about you as "that doctor who became evil and killed his patients" rather than the millions of years of good service that came before.

What else is there to do but internalize the fact that you'll forever be seen as a monster and a freak, and embrace it? People already see you as a murderer for that blackmail deal you did, so why not become an actual murderer and just start killing people on a whim? People already see you as an irredeemable monster who puts a stain on the Autobot name, so why beg for their forgiveness when you could just shun them back? You've already become a murderer, a traitor, and a horrible doctor, so what's a few more evil acts added to the pile? It's not like anyone will ever forgive you or love you ever again.

Why care? Why try to hold on to your principles of compassion, kindness, medical ethics, when an entire lifetime of being a good person did nothing to save you from blackmail and then abandonment? Why put yourself through the emotional agony of feeling lonely, guilty, miserable, when you could just... stop caring, and not hurt any more?